Open Production and Closed Production

In the last class we discussed collaborative and open source production, and we introduced Wikipedia and compared it to standard academic encylcopedias such as Encyclopedia Britannica. I want to make the comparison a bit more explicit.

Both Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Britannica are examples of collaborative production. They are publications that are created through the cooperative efforts of many people. Similarly, in both cases these group efforts aim to produce something similar: an encyclopedia–a publication that is intended to provide authoritative information on a wide range of topics.

Both Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Britannica are also available online. Keep this in mind, because it indicates that the use of internet technology is not the determining factor in the fundamental characteristics of each project. Part of what it means to refer to the internet as a socio-technical network is that the character of the network (the things it allows us to do, for example) depends both on what the technology makes possible and on the social arrangements (the decisions people make) about how to use the technology, or how to allow others to use the technology. Both these projects use the internet, but the project organizers have made different decisions about what they should allow people to do with their projects while using the internet.

What we will focus on today is how each of these projects is an example of an open or closed production model.

In general, an open production model has the following characteristics:

• Fewer barriers to participation in the production process;
• Access to materials produced is relatively unrestricted

In contrast, a closed production model has these characteristics:

• More barriers to participation in the production process;
• Access to materials produced is more restricted

Today we will examine Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Britannica and try to gather specific examples that indicate how each process might be following one or another of these models. We will also try to see how each project attempts to demonstrate how its chosen production model helps to produce an authoritative, credible resource.

We will work in four groups, two looking at Wikipedia, the other two at Britannica. For the purposes of this exercise, the Wikipedia group should look particularly at About Wikipedia and the Britannica group at About Britannica (and associated links), though each group should also explore their respective sites further.

On your individual weblogs, write a brief entry this week (due at the beginning of Friday’s class) in which you consider, using at least a few specific examples a) how your assigned site is an example of an open or closed process, and b) how the project’s process might produce an authoritative, credible resource.

We will examine the sites today and have our discussion on this issue on Friday.

Some questions to consider:

• How do you get access to information at the site? Are there restrictions on access?
• Who produces information? How is participation in this process restricted?
• Are there different rules for different types of information?
• How does the project try to ensure the information produced is accurate/authoritative/credible?
• Britannica blog
• Open Britannica
• Britannica Board, terms of use,